Vespers

Forty

Leaving the ventilation tower and running across the boardwalk, Gentry found Kathy Leung and her brawny camera operator T-Bone Harrold where he knew they’d be: right where he’d left them. Waiting for a story.

The small bats were beginning to swarm around the ventilation tower, and police were asking the reporters to withdraw to the nearby Coast Guard buildings. Several of the print journalists were cooperating but not Kathy, T-Bone, and their small mobile crew. Gentry knew that she wouldn’t be going anywhere without a video of the bat. In fact, he had been counting on that.

As they’d run from the tower, Joyce and Gentry had agreed that they couldn’t go back to Manhattan. With the tunnel fans shut down, the giant bat would be able to backtrack through the tunnel and fight her way back to her nest. Or if she got free of the elevator shaft, she would be able to follow Nancy by air. Either way, it would be bad for the city.

When the bat’s attack became audible on the island itself, Gentry surprised Kathy by asking for a ride.

“Sorry, but I’m not going back!” she informed him. T-Bone had the video camera on his shoulder. Kathy motioned for him to snap on his lights.

“I’m not asking you to go back,” Gentry said.

She seemed startled.

“I’m asking for a ride to Liberty Island.”

Kathy regarded him suspiciously. “Why?”

“Because the big bat made Nancy.”

“The bat what?”

“It knows she’s the one who killed her mate!” Gentry said.

“The bat’s breaking through the tunnel toget to me,” Joyce said. “When we leave she’ll probably follow us. What we want to do is lead her and the other vespersaway from the city.”

“And you want us to take you.”

“Right, Kath,” Gentry said.

“What a story,” Kathy said. “Thank you, God.”

Gentry said, “I’ve gotta warn you, though. Things will get hairy if the bat reaches the island.”

“If?”

Joyce said, “She’s tired and extremely pregnant, and we’re hoping she belly-flops into the sea.”

“T-Bone.”

“I’ll keep my camera pointed in her direction.”

As they started toward the boat, Gentry reiterated that the bat was obviously very determined. Kathy said she understood the risks. T-Bone shrugged his big shoulders and said that he was with the lady.

As large chunks of stone fell from the south side of the ventilation tower, the reporter dismissed her mobile unit. She said that she and T-Bone would go directly to the studio when they had their footage. In time for the morning news show, she promised.

Meanwhile, Gentry and Joyce helped T-Bone load his equipment behind the two pedestal seats of his producer’s twenty-one-foot fishing boat. Gentry knew there was no way he’d be leaving that behind, so he didn’t even attempt to persuade him. The three of them had to stop every few seconds to swat at vesper advance guards. More than the crashes echoing from the tower, the vespers were an indication of how close the female was.

Kathy started the engine and took the helm. Gentry slid into the seat beside her. Joyce and T-Bone crouched in the cramped stern, looking back at the tower. T-Bone pulled a bottle of seltzer from his equipment vest and offered some to Joyce. She declined. When everyone was secure, Kathy pushed the 225-horsepower engine to its maximum speed and tore from the dock.

As the island receded, Gentry ducked low behind the windscreen. He turned and asked Joyce for her radio. Holding it close to protect it from the wild sea spray, Gentry called Weeks.

“Where are you?” Weeks demanded.

“We’re in one of the news boats heading west!” Gentry shouted into the mouthpiece.

“Where west?”

“I’ll explain in a second. What’s the status of your SWAT teams?”

“Their launch is pinned down,” Weeks informed him. “The bats are in an uproar again. What the hell is going on out there?”

Gentry said, “The big bat was nearly through the floor of the ventilation tower.”

“Jesus! What’s that fucking animalmade of?”

“Muscle, mostly,” Gentry replied. “And she’s after Nancy. Instead of coming back into the city we decided to head to Liberty Island. Nancy feels that even if the bat can make the trip, a mile-long flight in strong air currents will exhaust her. What kind of personnel are on the island?”

“Hold on. I’ll-”

“Robert!”Joyce cried.

“Comin’ atcha!”added T-Bone, who had hoisted his camera onto his shoulder.

The detective spun around. T-Bone hadn’t turned on the floodlight so Gentry squinted into the dark.

There was an emergency lamp over the front entrance to the tower. In the small, sharp cone of light Gentry saw the giant bat literally push down the door. A cloud of ethyl chloride followed the animal out, dusting its back with a frigid coat. The bat took two hops toward the sea and vaulted skyward. She flew close to the water, followed by a train of small bats. Occasionally, the bat would rise, glide for a moment, then drop and resume flapping.

“She’s got to be within minutes of giving birth,” Joyce said. “She’s having trouble staying aloft.”

“Not trouble enough! She’s closing the gap,” Gentry said. He turned and looked at the control panel. “Fifty-three miles an hour. Is that the best we can do, Kath?”

“That’s top speed!” Kathy shouted apologetically.

Gentry ducked back down behind the windscreen. “Gordon? Are you still there?”

“Here!”

“The bat’s out and she’s following us.”

“Do you have a weapon?”

“Yeah. An empty one. Listen, we’ll be at the Statue of Liberty dock in less than a minute. What’ve you got for me?”

“Wait,” Weeks said. “Marius is talking to the park police.”

Gentry waited. He glanced ahead. The statue was brightly lit, an ethereal, washed-out green against the starless sky. They were less than a half mile from the low wall that surrounded the island.

Hope,he thought as he looked out at the statue. Wasn’t that what Lady Liberty was all about?

Weeks came back on. “Okay, here it is. Sergeant Julie Gilheany is opening the main door, back of the monument. She and another officer will lay down cover fire for as long as they can. Listen. I’m assuming the bats are going to follow you out there. When they do, we’re going to get our SWAT teams onto the water. If they can get close enough to pick off the giant-”

“I understand,” Gentry said. “We’ll lay low.”

Weeks wished him luck. Gentry thanked him, then put the radio in his jacket pocket. Holding on to the windscreen, he stood, half turned, and told the others the game plan. As he did he could see the giant bat illuminated by the reflected glow of the statue. The thing was roughly a quarter of a mile away and coming after them slowly but doggedly. Her dark army was spread behind her, their numbers growing.

“This is unfuckingreal,” T-Bone said as he videotaped the swarm. “I feel like I’m inThe Outer Limits.”

Nancy was also watching the bats. She was hunched over and seemed beaten. Gentry leaned toward her and lightly squeezed her left shoulder. Without turning, she reached across and touched his hand. Her fingers were cold. He wished he could think of something hopeful to say that wasn’t naive or a lie.

He looked back toward the island.

Roughly two hundred feet separated the dock from the entrance to Fort Wood, the star-shaped structure that serves as the foundation for the statue. Kathy swung around to the east side of the island and came to a hard, jolting stop alongside the dock.

Kathy jumped out and Gentry followed. He told her to run ahead while he helped Nancy out. Instead, she stayed to give T-Bone a hand with his camera and equipment case. Together, the foursome ran along the asphalt walk toward the large doors. Gentry stayed close to Joyce. She was tired and not moving as fast as the others. They swung around the left side of the statue. The tall double bronze doors were open. Inside the statue’s lobby entranceway stood two United States park police officers. One held a 9-mm pistol, the other a pump-action shotgun.

The park police sergeant had stepped outside with her shotgun. She aimed skyward.

“You’d better move!” she shouted to the group without taking her eyes from the bat.

They were about thirty feet from the doors. Gentry glanced behind him. The giant bat had just crossed the shoreline and was bearing down. The advance guard of vespers had slipped around the female and were slicing toward them.

Nancy screamed as two of the bats bit her shin. She stumbled, but Gentry wouldn’t let her fall. He caught her around the waist and pulled her up even as a flurry of bats dug into the back of his neck and chewed on his left leg.

Gentry heard Kathy shriek as bats descended. The reporter kept running. She dropped the lights she was holding and pushed both hands through her hair, trying to dislodge the bats. Her cries were followed by the distinctivepup-pup-pup of the 9-mm as the second officer raced from the fort.

“Berk, get back!” the sergeant cried.

“I’ll be okay!” the young man said. Still firing, he ran past Gentry.

“No!”Gentry barked. But he was tired from the run and his voice was a raw wheeze. He wished he could turn and pull the officer back, but he didn’t want to let go of Nancy.

Suddenly, Gentry felt a sharp shooting pain run up his left leg from his ankle. Several bats were attacking his shin and one of them had taken a bite from his Achilles tendon. But the detective refused to go down. The bats were growing more numerous every second. If Gentry dropped he wouldn’t be getting back up. He swallowed a cry and dragged the leg behind him.

Kathy reached the entrance, followed by T-Bone. She was still struggling with bats. T-Bone pulled two from his own head, crushed them in his giant hands, then did the same with the vespers that were in Kathy’s hair.

“Berk!”the sergeant cried again.

Gentry heard a scream. He turned and saw bats attacking the officer’s hands. A moment later hundreds of small bats slammed into his torso. The force of the impact lifted him several inches off the stone walkway and dropped him on his back. Then the giant bat crashed down on his chest. The officer’s arms flew out and he vomited a plume of blood.

“Berk!God -” The sergeant wailed and raised her shotgun.

The giant bat’s eyes and ears were not on her victim. They were on Joyce. Shaking her head angrily and closing her wings, the creature crawled from the body and lumbered through a cloud of thousands of small bats. Her eyes were narrow, her mouth fierce. Bent low and moving slowly, she clawed across the twenty yards to the door.

Gentry and Joyce ran past the sergeant. A fist of bats flew in with them, knocking the sergeant down before she could fire. T-Bone rushed over and pulled the second door shut. It closed with a heavy slam just as the giant bat hopped toward it. There were six smaller doors behind the ornamental front doors.

Gentry wrestled the bats from his neck, then helped Nancy with the vespers that were viciously biting her hands and forearms. When she was finally free of bats, Joyce ran to help T-Bone and Kathy, who had gone to assist the sergeant. Apart from being vocally angry at herself for having lost the camera lights, Gentry was pleased to see that Kathy had it pretty well together.

The enormous bat hit the outer door hard. The lobby resounded with a thick, echoingthud.

While the others were still struggling, Gentry tied a handkerchief around his ankle to try and stanch the bleeding. Then he rose. The pain had abated somewhat and he put his weight on the foot. It wobbled as if it were asleep and his ankle flared hotly. Favoring his right leg, Gentry looked around for the shotgun. He spotted it lying near the display of the statue’s original torch, which had been replaced during the centenary restoration. The bat continued to hit the door. Gentry limped toward it, stopping several feet away, off to the side. He slipped his arm securely through the strap. He cradled the heavy rifle in his left hand and raised it to his shoulder.

“Come on, you misery,” he said through his teeth. “Come on.”

Behind Gentry, obviously frustrated with the tenacity of the remaining vespers, T-Bone had reached into his vest and retrieved the seltzer bottle. After shaking it vigorously, he shouted for the women to back away from the sergeant. Placing his thumb over the mouth of the bottle he turned the spray on the bats, concentrating on the ones clustered around Sergeant Gilheany’s head. The vespers hopped off; when they did, he stomped them as though they were spiders. Then, with the help of Kathy and Joyce, the sergeant was able to crush the rest of the bats.

Suddenly, the pounding at the front door stopped. After standing frozen for several seconds, Gentry lowered the shotgun.

T-Bone absently wiped his wet thumb on his trousers. “What coulda happened to her?”

“I don’t know,” Joyce said.

Kathy helped Sergeant Gilheany to her feet. “As soon as I can I want to go out and get Officer Berk’s remains.”

With the pounding stopped, they could hear the clawing of all the other bats. They were scratching on the stone walls, on the door, on the roof. It was claustrophobic and unnerving.

Gentry jumped when he heard a voice in his pocket. The radio. He slipped it out. “Gentry here.”

“Are you all okay?” It was Weeks.

“We lost one of the park officers,” Gentry said. “The rest of us are inside the fort. Can you see what’s happening?”

“We’re watching the statue from our window,” Weeks said. “And it looks like you’ve got two problems. The first is that every bat in New York seems to be nesting on the statue.”

“We know. What’s the second problem?”

Weeks said, “It looks like the giant bat found a way inside.”